Lula And Bolsonaro Face Run-Off After Tight Result

Brazil’s election is going into second a second round in which left-winger Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva will face far-right incumbent Jair Bolsonaro.

With almost all the votes counted, Lula had won 48% against Bolsonaro’s 43% – a much closer result than opinion polls had suggested.

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But Lula fell short of the more than 50% of valid votes needed to prevent a run-off.

Voters now have four weeks to decide which of the two should lead Brazil. Winning outright in the first round was always going to be a tall order for any presidential candidate – the last time it happened was 24 years ago.

But President Bolsonaro and Lula gave their supporters hope that they could achieve just that. Both candidates can and will claim this a victory, though.

Lula has already said that this is a “mere delay” on his way to the presidency. For the 76-year-old former metal worker – who could not run in the 2018 election because he was in prison after being convicted on corruption charges which were later annulled – this spells a remarkable comeback.

And President Bolsonaro, whom opinion polls had shown trailing far behind Lula, will rejoice in the fact he proved the pollsters wrong, just as he had predicted he would.

This is a drama which has been years in the making. The two men are arch-rivals and spent much of the campaign trading insults.

In the last TV debate before the vote, President Bolsonaro called Lula a thief, in reference to the corruption charges that put him behind bars for 580 days before the conviction.

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Meanwhile, the European Union (EU) parliament has passed a new law requiring all new smartphones, tablets and cameras to be charged using USB-C as standard from late 2024 onwards.

EU lawmakers voted in favour of a measure that would push Apple to drop its outdated Lightning port on its iPhones for the USB-C one already used by many of its competitors.

Makers of laptops will have extra time, from early 2026, to also follow suit. The EU wants to make life simpler for Europeans by banning the use of different chargers for each type of device. It hopes that the new rule will reduce costs for consumers as well as reduce landfills full of old chargers.